Thorn Cycles Forum
Community => Non-Thorn Related => Topic started by: macspud on July 15, 2014, 09:43:03 PM
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Hi,
Has anyone tried one of these for cooking and charging batteries?
http://www.biolitestove.com/products/campstove/
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"No fuel to buy or carry
Our stoves cook your meals with nothing but the twigs you collect on your journey, eliminating the need for heavy, expensive, polluting petroleum gas. Quick to light, fast to boil and easy to use."
After pedaling 200 miles on the day, you'll go on a scavenger hunt for twigs, after a couple of hours gather an armful, and be able prepare a cupful of lukewarm tea. In the morning, hungry and short-tempered, you'll turn into a major pulluter when you empty out the fine white ash of the twigs that provided so little energy. Of course, the thing might work, at least for food (not the iPhone), if you were to carry hardwood or prepared charcoal to burn, not to mention the bulk requiring a trailer for your fuel alone. The weight of enough hardwood or charcoal for a tour will soon make a few gas cannisters seem like feathers. Someone's having us on.
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I am with Andre ... rather pointless device ... a jack of all trades and master of none. I prefer to stick to my dynamo and maybe a solar panel to charge a battery if needed and my lightweight stove to do what it is designed to do, cook me dinner and make a cup of hot chocolate :) .
Andrew
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I've read accounts by people who have used similar stoves on N-to-S hikes across the western US states, and on weeklong group canoeing trips in Eastern Ontario & W Québec I've eaten breakfasts & suppers cooked on grills over campfires. Different circumstances, similar reliance on scavenging reasonably dry tinder, wood, pine cones, etc. (For the canoeing, don't even think about it unless you are reasonably sure of a healthy supply of birch bark.)
Workable, I guess, so long as it doesn't rain much, and you're camping early in the season so that your campsites haven't been already denuded by hungry fire-makers ...
I'd stick with a reliable stove -- maybe alcohol, to satisfy one's renewable conscience?
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I'd stick with a reliable stove -- maybe alcohol, to satisfy one's renewable conscience?
That is what I use; a Trail Designs Sidewinder Ti-Tri Cooking System (http://aushiker.com/owner-review-trail-designs-sidewinder-ti-tri-3-fuel-cooking-system/) in my case.
(http://i1.wp.com/aushiker.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/IMG_27921.jpg?resize=550%2C412)
Andrew
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Hi,
Has anyone tried one of these for cooking and charging batteries?
http://www.biolitestove.com/products/campstove/
Hi
I saw one in Cotswold Outdoor the other day. Nice to look at. Very heavy.
John
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Thanks all for your replies.
I had thought much the same myself when I came across it on the web. Sometimes we can write things off too easily at first glance, so thought I'd ask if anyone on here had hands on experience with one.
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I've read accounts by people who have used similar stoves on N-to-S hikes across the western US states, and on weeklong group canoeing trips in Eastern Ontario & W Québec I've eaten breakfasts & suppers cooked on grills over campfires. Different circumstances, similar reliance on scavenging reasonably dry tinder, wood, pine cones, etc. (For the canoeing, don't even think about it unless you are reasonably sure of a healthy supply of birch bark.)
Shh, John. We don't want want to tell too many people about the lovely places where there are more trees than people...